Rapid Fire August 27, 2012: Pentagon Consolidates Urgent Acquisitions
You can do this!
Army Sustainment explains the intricacies involved in recovering an RG-31 MRAP that rolled over last year on “little more than a goat trail” in Northern Afghanistan. Plan A involved lifting the ditched vehicle with a massive MRAP Recovery Vehicle, but after a rocky trip just to get there, the MRV failed – it turned out after the operation because of a simple loose fuse. Then came plans B and C, and eventual success.
August 24 directive 5000.71 [PDF] signed by Pentagon #2 Ashton Carter formalizes the role of the Warfighter Senior Integration Group (SIG) to manage Urgent Operational Needs (UONs). Carter chairs the SIG. This directive replaces “Meeting Immediate Warfighter Needs” from 2004 that at the time established the Joint Rapid Acquisition Cell (JRAC). That recentralization has been in the works since June last year with DTM 11-006 (DoD July 2011 | Signal Feb 2012).
The CSBA think tank released 2 new reports late last week: an analysis of FY13 budget and sequestration, and a review of cyber-warfare which concludes that concerns of cyber conflicts have merits but the threat should not be conflated, in terms of scale, with nuclear devastation.
Meanwhile the Institute for the Study of War has a backgrounder [PDF] on Israeli missile defense.
As both the Obama and Romney campaigns think they are winning the arguments on (defense) budgets, a pre-election deal on sequestration looks unlikely.
US Army Contracting Command is hiring up to 150 entry-level (GS-7) contract specialists and seeking recent college grads to fill in these positions.
